Instructor

Prof. Chandra Venkataraman, Prof. Y.S. Mayya

Semester

Autumn ‘21

Course Difficulty

Content wise heavy, a wide range of topics covered in the course of 4 months, might get overwhelming. You will be expected to finish reading material (avg. 10 pages document) before each class

Time Commitment Required

out of class hours 5 hours per week (according to me)

Grading Policy and Statistics

Mid-semester exam – 20, Final-exam - 30, Quizzes – 10, Problems &
Comprehensive problems – 20, Course project / presentation – 10, Class participation - 10

AA 2
AU 2
BB 2
BC 1
CD 1
DD 1
FR 3

Attendance Policy

Class participation marks, so in a way compulsory

Pre-requisites

Knowledge about photochemistry and background in atmospheric chemistry

Topics Covered in the Course

Atmospheric composition and climate, thermodynamics and microscale stability, gases and radiation, atmospheric chemical kinetics, photochemistry, atmospheric aerosols, dry and wet deposition processes, aerosols light scattering, aerosols and climate, cloud physics, cloud forcing of climate, chemistry of clouds and fogs

Teaching Style

Lectures slides used for teaching in class (slides not exhaustive), further a 20 pages (approx) document- reading material to be covered before each class. In each class you are supposed to come prepared with the answer of a question given to you before itself and speak for about 2 minutes, that carried about 10% weightage

Tutorials/Assignments/Projects

comprehensive problems, very important for understanding the concepts and from exam point of view, grading for completion and efforts

Project: topic relevant to course content
literature review, modelling/analysis on real data (actual outputs expected)

Feedback on Exams

I found the exams difficult because covering the content before exams, keeping up with classes was itself a challenge for me. I didn’t put in enough efforts to cover the long reading material before each class.

Motivation for taking this course

I am into meteorology, climate change, sustainability and have worked on the same in the past. I thought learning about atmospheric processes and chemistry will help me in my future research work.

How strongly would I recommend this course?

YOU WILL NEED TO PUT A LOT OF EFFORTS.

When to take this course?

Autumn semester, fourth year

References Used

1. Atmospheric chemistry and physics: From air pollution to climate change, J.H. Seinfeld and S.N. Pandis,
   Wiley, 1998, ISBN 0 471 178160. [S&P]

2. Fundamentals of atmospheric modeling, M.Z. Jacobson, Cambridge University Press, 1999, ISBN 0 521
3. [MZJ]

Review By: Misari Bhanani